ST: S'pore aims to be big data hub

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#1
Whoare the likely beneficiaries...

S'pore aims to be big data hub

IDA wants to attract firms and scientists, given huge potential of big data analysis

Published on Jul 04, 2013


By Grace Chng Senior Correspondent

SINGAPORE aims to be a big data hub in South-east Asia by tapping into databases here and enabling businesses to make better decisions from the information gathered, according to the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA).

"We're seeing foreign gaming, media and entertainment companies with regional offices in Singapore hubbing their customer insights here. They will be making their big data decisions here," said Mr Andrew Khaw, IDA's senior director for industry development group.

Big data - and the sub-categories of business analytics and data analytics - refers to the massive data held in public and corporate databases including information culled from social networks, e-mail messages, surveillance videos and other places.

An in-depth analysis of big data can guide companies to make decisions, such as tailoring TV shows and selling suitable insurance products for the different demographic groups.

In particular, the size of the business analytics market is expected to surge to US$123billion (S$155billion) by 2015, according to research firm IDC.

Given the enormous potential here for insights arising from big data analysis, Singapore wants to attract big data companies and data scientists to crunch the voluminous amount of data collected, said Mr Khaw. In turn, big data will help the local IT industry and businesses become more productive and competitive, he added.

While businesses here are increasingly interested in big data, they may not have the capability to tap its potential, said Mr Khaw.

In the United States, he added, new big data start-ups have helped companies gain valuable insights from the aggregated data, and IDA aims to help companies here in the same way.

As a start, it launched the Data Innovation Challenge last week by inviting data scientists from around the world to provide solutions to big data problems.

Data scientists taking part in the challenge will be tapping data sets from both the public and private sectors.

From the public sector alone, there are more than 8,000 data sets that are available for these scientists to access.

IDA will also work with five firms here to define big data problems for the scientists to brainstorm solutions. So far, four firms have signed up for the challenge: health-care company Medtronic, online grocer RedMart, online digital agency WPP and material science manufacturer DSM Engineering Plastics.

IDA hopes to generate about 20 workable ideas from the challenge, of which seven will be used to build commercially viable prototypes over the next few months.

Mr Khaw hopes the challenge will showcase Singapore as a place to build solutions from big data in areas like financial services and insurance, health care, manufacturing, advertising and marketing.

chngkeg@sph.com.sg
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#2
Keppel T&T will be major beneficiary?
Before you speak, listen. Before you write, think. Before you spend, earn. Before you invest, investigate. Before you criticize, wait. Before you pray, forgive. Before you quit, try. Before you retire, save. Before you die, give. –William A. Ward

Think Asset-Business-Structure (ABS)
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#3
Possibly industrial reits financing the construction of data centres ? Mapletree Industrial Trust is currently constructing a data centre for Equinix (108 mil - 217 mil cost depending on options) and it will be leased to Equinix for 20 + 5 + 5 years.

(Not Vested)
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#4
I'm quite puzzled by this - hosting data centres in Singapore which is known to be expensive?
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#5
(04-07-2013, 12:51 PM)egghead Wrote: I'm quite puzzled by this - hosting data centres in Singapore which is known to be expensive?

You are right to be puzzled. Big data hub does not equal to a hub with data centers, but a hub with data scientists, in the context of the published article.

Wikipedia definition:
Big data is a collection of data sets so large and complex that it becomes difficult to process using on-hand database management tools or traditional data processing applications.

IIRC, Starhub is the only Singapore public listed company involved in Singapore. Others are Dell, Intel etc.

http://sg.finance.yahoo.com/news/starhub...03574.html

http://www.zdnet.com/sg/dell-intel-open-...000016291/
“夏则资皮,冬则资纱,旱则资船,水则资车” - 范蠡
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#6
So the "big" here is part of a noun ("big data") and not an adjective. I was confused only because I did not read carefully. Thanks!
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#7
(04-07-2013, 02:35 PM)egghead Wrote: So the "big" here is part of a noun ("big data") and not an adjective. I was confused only because I did not read carefully. Thanks!

Welcome.

It seems other buddies also confuse with the term. Big Grin
“夏则资皮,冬则资纱,旱则资船,水则资车” - 范蠡
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